Vincent Kituku and his former teacher, Albert Ndeke Thirika, embrace one another after many years apart. (Submitted by Vincent Kituku)
By Vincent Kituku
Therefore encourage one another and build each other up… — 1 Thessalonians 5:11
The year was 1978. The results of the rehearsal exam that prepared us for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exam were announced. I was the best performer out of 120 candidates.
Mr. Albert Ndeke Thirika, a teacher in my high school, was my Christian Religious Education (CRE) teacher in my sophomore year. He was tall, slender, with an ever-present smile that was magnified by the longest well-kept beard that I had ever seen.
Mr. Thirika didn’t just teach CRE. He was a Walking Sermon. Teaching CRE, he seemed like a great author who happens to be an actor, acting in a movie for which he wrote the script. The emotions, basic applications and natural goodness made the subject something to look forward to, a pleasing distraction from the mathematics and science subjects I was attempting to be good at. A love for reading the Bible was imprinted in my heart.
Father Heran, a Catholic priest from Ireland, was the principal of my high school and taught CRE to the junior and senior class students. He took over where Mr. Thirika left off. He taught us the Old Testament in our junior class and St. Luke According to African Cultures in my senior class.
Although Mr. Thirika (I can’t bring myself to call him Albert) was not teaching me at the time when I was the top student, he monitored my performance. When the results were announced, he looked for me and gave me Ksh.20. That is 20 Kenya Shillings – the equivalent of $.16 today.
That $.16 was the most amount of money I had been given by any human being in my life up to that point. Not even my dad or mother had been so generous.
Mr. Thirika expressed how proud he was of me and said something that still makes me cry (even now) whenever I remember. “Mr. Kituku (he was the only teacher who called me Mr. Kituku), I see greatness in you.” From that moment on, I never wanted to disappoint my teacher with poor performance.
I don’t recall seeing Mr. Thirika after I left Tala High School at the end of November 1978. But since founding Caring Hearts High Schools (two boarding schools for vulnerable boys and girls in Kenya), I have often shared the impact a caring teacher can have in the life of a student.
Jonathan Nthiwa, a former teacher at Caring Hearts High School, happened to be in a WhatsApp chat group with one female member whose last name is Thirika. Jonathan asked her whether her dad was ever a teacher at Tala High School in the 1970s. Professor Ann Thirika, a physics instructor at Egerton University, Kenya, affirmed that Mr. Thirika was her dad. All Jonathan said was, “My boss speaks highly of him.”
Prof. Thirika gave Jonathan her dad’s phone number. I called. When he heard my voice, he said, “Is that Mr. Kituku, the bright student who was at Tala High School?”
On July 18, 2026, I had the God-appointed opportunity to recognize Mr. Thirika in front of 1,500 people including my mother, my wife and two of our adult children and our sponsors from Idaho, USA. Others included Mr. Thirika’s wife, son and daughter (twins), daughter-in-law, niece and their pilot (the name Mr. Thirika called their driver) and the teachers who have heard about him for years. Jonathan was there, too.
That’s the encouragement, I pray, to give people in my daily walk in this fading journey we call life. It is at the heart of my soul, and I have Mr. Thirika to thank for that.
Dr. Vincent Muli Wa Kituku is an author and founder of Caring Hearts and Hands of Hope, Caring Hearts High Schools, and Ngoo Sya Wendo Hospital. Visit him at www.Kituku.com.
